Tennis Forever

[raagadevan]

In win-obsessed world, Nadal offered education in defeat

The Straits Times;Tuesday, Feb 04, 2014

Joan Solsona is painting a competitive picture. Rafael Nadal, he beckons me to imagine, is skipping stones across the water. A friend is winning this idle competition, so Nadal cannot stop. His compulsion is to be the better man.

"He has to be a winner," says Solsona, "otherwise it's like he cannot sleep. If he doesn't win, everyone must keep playing. In golf, it is the same. These are his hobbies, imagine what he is like in tennis, his professional life."

My conversation with Solsona - a Spanish journalist who has known Nadal since he was 12 - occurs an hour before the Australian Open final last Sunday as I try to comprehend Nadal's urge to win. If his appetite for victory suggests a primitive stone-age man with a club, it also makes him a more evolved competitor than his peers. Yet this idea is transplanted after the final by a even more baffling consideration. If winning is so essential to his being, how does he lose so well?

That Nadal fought on against Stanislas Wawrinka was an answering to the coding of his DNA. Expected you might think, yet fellow athletes, who understand effort better than us, swooned. Joel Selwood, an Australian Rules football captain, from a physically brutal sport, tweeted: "Would love #Nadal as a team-mate!" But if Nadal had quit, this might have been understandable. Accosted again by injury he was agonised by it, but never let it win. This victory he didn't allow.

He played on for he answered another code, a worthy, unwritten one, that demands you complete a match. To finish is to not hand the other man an amputated victory and in effect you are honouring the man who is destroying you. But if Nadal said he did this for Wawrinka, and the fans, he also did it "for me". To finish is to practise not giving up, it is to give yourself a chance - Wawrinka might have collapsed - and it is later a reflection of who he is: the man who gave everything. Or else is nothing.

Sainthood is not on offer in athletic arenas for to expect it is to strip sport of its different complexions and to misunderstand its madness. If we are hostile in the stands, imagine the middle. Imagine the fury, the exhaustion, the want. The athlete is immersed, even lost, often deaf, in this reactive, instinctive world of no respite. That he can think clearly is staggering, that he might hurl an unsavoury epithet at himself or a toss a racket is human.

Yet as much as we relish the mercurial man, we must marvel at how Nadal kept a hold of himself while his world fell apart. There is unkind chatter over his medical time-out as a calculated ploy - a tennis version of football's diver - but if he returned immediately to 195kmh serves and unaffected sprints then a case might be made. But no, he was hurt, it was evident, and the issue instead was his ability to reach into a decency when the moment was uniquely indecent to him.

The endurance of Nadal lies not in miles run but conversely in days of sitting idle as the instrument that is his body was being repaired. He endured pain in the knees, he endured frustration as other men rose while he had fallen, he endured even as his stationary life reversed the very idea of his existence.

Everything must be rebuilt, over months, first body, then movement, then precision, then hope, and then another body part, this time the back, mutinies. You want to smash every racket at this bullying by life - why me, why again - yet after the match, with no time for calmness to settle, Nadal says: "Just a tough day. But lot of people in the world have a lot of very tough days. I am not this kind of person, so I feel very lucky."

Nadal's uncle forbade the throwing of a racket for it was disrespectful to an instrument many kids ache to own. Such tutoring by family to distinguish between athletic disappointment and real suffering has kept him from an excessively self-centred view of life. Taught by the example of Roger Federer, he has found the balance between sport and life. Educated by the brutality of his sport - "You're out there alone. You really are. It's the ultimate one-on-one sport," said Pete Sampras - it has bred a particular respect: you are alone, but you understand so is the next man.

Nadal did not skip his press conference, for tennis demands the athlete must confront rival, crowd and then interrogation. This is his job, yet here also lay his mettle. On the third question on his injured back, he responded: "It is not the moment, as I said after the first question. This is not the moment to talk a lot about the back."

To a query on the briefly petulant crowd, he noted: "You never will hear me talk badly about the crowd here."

Winning tells grand stories as it did about Wawrinka's urge to improve in athletic middle-age, but the champion is not enough in sport. To decode sport, we need the defeated man. For everyone is defeated and only in the emotional, public whirlpool of loss can we appreciate the core of the athlete. We see them wear masks, resort to cliche, show defiance - and why not, they are hurt - but also lift. Such athletes reveal to us not mythical hero, but fine human player.

And, if we can - and must - look past this tribalistic and mundane view of tennis, where to elevate Federer we must diminish Nadal, and vice versa, we will find a grateful education. For by being weepy yet never whiny, Nadal defeated self-pity. Like a stone thrown over water, he, the competitor, skipped over sports' demons and found grace on the other shore. This is victory in itself.

http://news.asiaone.com/news/sports/...eat?page=0%2C1

[ajithfederer]

It is. Isn't it?

An absolute gem of a comment where in a fellow tables all "such instances" in the same article.

May be except for 2011 (when Djokovic bashed him fair-and-square) and late last year, but from 2009 (not looking at earlier instances), almost all of Rafa's losses have been "attributed to injury", in one way or another. Or "fatigue".

Cases in point - loss to Soderling at RG09, loss to del Potro at USO09, WTF09, retirement at AO10, WTF10, loss to Rosol, Darcis and now, Stan.

Similarly... He was "fatigued" in his losses to Roger at WTFs in 2010 and 2011 (where he was pummelled, btw), but the very next week - he most certainly was fresh as ever and took his country to Davis Cup victories.

Of course, many other matches which I haven't bothered mentioning (e.g. walkover to Murray at Miami 2012), the numerous "dubious" timeouts during a match [v. Del Potro at Wimbledon 2011 (not the US Open like you've mentioned), v. Federer at RG 2011, etc.] and the like.

Some instances I could quickly pen down... I am sure there are more.

2006 - Roger Federer calls out Toni - midmatch - for illlegal coaching.
2006 - Ivan Lubijic got pissed off with Rafa's time wasting and made it clear everyone wanted Federer to win the French.
2006 - Scolding Tomas Berdych who made a "Shhh" gesture to the crowd after beating Rafa.
2007 - Robin Soderling, at Wimbledon, for time-wasting and butt-picking before every point.
2008 - Medical time-out against Federer in Hamburg while he was losing.
2010 - Retires against Andy Murray at the Australian Open (but "bravely battles" David Ferrer next year)
2010 - Medical time-out against Philipp Petzschner and illegal coaching
2010 - Wimbledon; against Robin Söderling. Argues and threatens umpire Carlos Ramos, I think. Even had the crowd jeering. Can you actually imagine Wimbledon center court crowd jeering Rafa!?!
2010 - World Tour Finals. Against Berdych. Argues with umpire Bernandez (one of the respected fellows) and threatens to not play.
2011 - Wimbledon; against Juan Martín del Potro. Takes a time out to get some tape cut, hobbles before MTO, comfortable goes on to win (despite tough DelPo fightback) afterwards.
2012 - Indian Wells; doesn't take a loo break before Federer serves for the match (play had already been suspended due to rain); but rushes for one just before *match point*.
2012 - Madrid; Blue clay is fine when he beats Nikolay Davydenko but dangerous when he blows a lead to Fernando Verdasco.
2012 - French open; conditions are good when winning and bad when losing.
2012 - Wimbledon; complaining about opponent, time wasting, illegal coaching and bumping on opponent (Lukas Rosol).
2013 - "Pain" after loss to Steve Darcis; nothing when winning almost everything all year!
2013 - Paris; Mysteriously loses to Ferrer, cites "rustiness", but handily defeats the same opponent four days later at the O2.
2014 - Australian Open again. Needn't elucidate.

Oh btw - returning to that fourth rounder you've referred to - he gave Asderaki an earful following the match, chatted sheepishly with Courier later and et voila! Eva was nowhere to be seen again

.

Pretty scathing stuff. Hard to argue with, though. Not to be discriminatory, but Spaniards have a fine track record of gamesmanship. I remember years back a bitter Davis Cup final in which USA (I think) accused Spain of cheating (final was played in Spain IIRC). People are going to pin him down more and more for these strategic breaks because there seems to be a pattern. And IF indeed he gets injured, again, he shouldn't complain so much about fast courts or ridicule the Sampras era as boring which he did.

[JamesDap]

Asderaki ran afoul of Serena as well. That time, Serena was the one who got berated but Asderaki didn't account for the diabolical powers of the problem solver. Hate the way ATP pays blind obeisance to Nadal in particular and the top guys in general. It's time for things to go full circle; it's the players who are getting too big for the sport. Not a comment on Federer by the way. Bad loser he may be, but he is pretty old school when it comes to time taken between serves and such.

[VinodKumar's]

2012 - Indian Wells; doesn't take a loo break before Federer serves for the match (play had already been suspended due to rain); but rushes for one just before *match point*.

He was welcomed with a wide ace match point

[raagadevan]

ATP Rankings (February 17, 2014)

1. Rafael Nadal(ESP) 14,085
2. Novak Djokovic(SRB) 10,580
3. Stanislas Wawrinka(SUI) 5,620
4. David Ferrer(ESP) 5,440
5. Juan Martin Del Potro(ARG) 4,960
6. Thomas Berdych(CZE) 4,950
7. Andy Murray(GBR) 4,795
8. Roger Federer(SUI) 4,305
9. Richard Gasquet(FRA) 2,950
10. Jo-Wilfried Tsonga(FRA) 2,885
11. Milos Raonic(CAN) 2,440
12. Tommy Haas(GER) 2,435
13. John Isner(USA) 2,320
14. Fabio Fognini (ITA) 2,260
15. Kei Nishikori (JPN) 2,170

[raagadevan]

4th-ranked David Ferrer of Spain loses to 54th–ranked Ukrainian Alexandr Dolgopolov 4-6, 4-6 in the Rio Open semifinal;
and 1st-ranked Rafael Nadal struggles past 40th ranked fellow Spaniard Pablo Andujar 2-6, 6-3, 7-6 (12-10) in the other semi.

[JamesDap]

Not related to any of the above news items, just something that occurred to me was: why do people rant about David Ferrer reaching semis of US Open or QF of Wimbledon AND go on to add that clay courters getting that far in the 90s was unthinkable. Because it's not true. Corretja reached the QF in 96 US Open and stretched Sampras to 5 sets. Kuerten also reached QF stage at both US and Wimbledon BEFORE either surface was slowed down. Kafelnikov won Aus Open and reached the semis of US Open. MAYBE people didn't notice these things at that time with the domination of Sampras and other attacking fast court specialists but to pass that off as a factual statement is unjustified. I am not denying for a minute that conditions changed in the new millennium. But that it was impossible for players with a mainly clay court based game to do well on fast courts seems to be more of an, er, American media myth than reality. Wilander, Lendl won US Open in 80s and even before graphite racquets, Vilas was able to win that tournament in 1977. That he was not a good serve and volley player (at least by the standards of the time) is borne out by the fact that Borg decided to practice playing aggressively in the 1976 QFs against him so that he would be prepared for the final against Nastase.

[raagadevan]

Rio semifinals - Highlights:

Source: ATP World Tour

http://www.atpworldtour.com/Media/Vi...W2dJlNZ7IWDq2Q

[raagadevan]

Alexandr Dolgopolov serves 10 aces, but also a double fault in the second set tie-breaker. Rafael Nadal wins the Rio Open 6-3, 7-6 (7-3).

Latvian Ernests Gulbis (ranked 23) wins the Marseille Open beating Frenchman Jo-Wilfried Tsonga (ranked 10) 7-6 (7-5), 6-4.

[omega]

Uncle Toni gives his take on Rafa's relationship with French fans:

http://www.tennis.com/pro-game/2014/...ch-fans/50713/

What's up with this clown (Uncle Toni)??